第251章

`Oh dear, how you talk!' cried old Arthur, edging himself closer still to Ralph. `Of course I didn't -- I don't pretend I did! I came to ask what you would take from me, if I prospered with the father, for this debt of yours -- five shillings in the pound -- six and-eightpence -- ten shillings?

I would go as far as ten for such a friend as you, we have always been on such good terms, but you won't be so hard upon me as that, I know.

Now, will you?'

`There's something more to be told,' said Ralph, as stony and immovable as ever.

`Yes, yes, there is, but you won't give me time,' returned Arthur Gride.

`I want a backer in this matter -- one who can talk, and urge, and press a point, which you can do as no man can. I can't do that, for I am a poor, timid, nervous creature. Now, if you get a good composition for this debt, which you long ago gave up for lost, you'll stand my friend, and help me.

Won't you?'

`There's something more,' said Ralph.

`No, no, indeed,' cried Arthur Gride.

`Yes, yes, indeed. I tell you yes,' said Ralph.

`Oh!' returned old Arthur feigning to be suddenly enlightened. `You mean something more, as concerns myself and my intention. Ay, surely, surely.

Shall I mention that?'

`I think you had better,' rejoined Ralph, drily.

`I didn't like to trouble you with that, because I supposed your interest would cease with your own concern in the affair,' said Arthur Gride. `That's kind of you to ask. Oh dear, how very kind of you! Why, supposing I had a knowledge of some property -- some little property -- very little --to which this pretty chick was entitled; which nobody does or can know of at this time, but which her husband could sweep into his pouch, if he knew as much as I do, would that account for --'

`For the whole proceeding,' rejoined Ralph, abruptly. `Now, let me turn this matter over, and consider what I ought to have if I should help you to success.'

`But don't be hard,' cried old Arthur, raising his hands with an imploring gesture, and speaking, in a tremulous voice. `Don't be too hard upon me.

It's a very small property, it is indeed. Say the ten shillings, and we'll close the bargain. It's more than I ought to give, but you're so kind --shall we say the ten? Do now, do.'

Ralph took no notice of these supplications, but sat for three or four minutes in a brown study, looking thoughtfully at the person from whom they proceeded. After sufficient cogitation he broke silence, and it certainly could not be objected that he used any needless circumlocution, or failed to speak directly to the purpose.

`If you married this girl without me,' said Ralph, `you must pay my debt in full, because you couldn't set her father free otherwise. It's plain, then, that I must have the whole amount, clear of all deduction or incumbrance, or I should lose from being honoured with your confidence, instead of gaining by it. That's the first article of the treaty. For the second, I shall stipulate that for my trouble in negotiation and persuasion, and helping you to this fortune, I have five hundred pounds -- that's very little, because you have the ripe lips, and the clustering hair, and what not, all to yourself. For the third and last article, I require that you execute a bond to me, this day, binding yourself in the payment of these two sums, before noon of the day of your marriage with Madeline Bray. You have told me I can urge and press a point. I press this one, and will take nothing less than these terms. Accept them if you like. If not, marry her without me if you can. I shall still get my debt.'

To all entreaties, protestations, and offers of compromise between his own proposals and those which Arthur Gride had first suggested, Ralph was deaf as an adder. He would enter into no further discussion of the subject, and while old Arthur dilated upon the enormity of his demands and proposed modifications of them, approaching by degrees nearer and nearer to the terms he resisted, sat perfectly mute, looking with an air of quiet abstraction over the entries and papers in his pocket-book. Finding that it was impossible to make any impression upon his staunch friend, Arthur Gride, who had prepared himself for some such result before he came, consented with a heavy heart to the proposed treaty, and upon the spot filled up the bond required (Ralph kept such instruments handy), after exacting the condition that Mr Nickleby should accompany him to Bray's lodgings that very hour, and open the negotiation at once, should circumstances appear auspicious and favourable to their designs.

In pursuance of this last understanding the worthy gentlemen went out together shortly afterwards, and Newman Noggs emerged, bottle in hand, from the cupboard, out of the upper door of which, at the imminent risk of detection, he had more than once thrust his red nose when such parts of the subject were under discussion as interested him most.

`I have no appetite now,' said Newman, putting the flask in his pocket.

`I've had my dinner.'

Having delivered this observation in a very grievous and doleful tone, Newman reached the door in one long limp, and came back again in another.

`I don't know who she may be, or what she may be,' he said: `but I pity her with all my heart and soul; and I can't help her, nor can I any of the people against whom a hundred tricks -- but none so vile as this --are plotted every day! Well, that adds to my pain, but not to theirs. The thing is no worse because I know it, and it tortures me as well as them.

Gride and Nickleby! Good pair for a curricle -- oh roguery! roguery! roguery!'

With these reflections, and a very hard knock on the crown of his unfortunate hat at each repetition of the last word, Newman Noggs, whose brain was a little muddled by so much of the contents of the pocket-pistol as had found their way there during his recent concealment, went forth to seek such consolation as might be derivable from the beef and greens of some cheap eating-house.